Revenue growth of Rocket Internet start-ups slows

German ecommerce investor Rocket Internet said the fast pace of expansion of its online start-ups slowed slightly in the last three months.BERLIN: German ecommerce investor Rocket Internet said the fast pace of expansion of its online start-ups slowed slightly in the last three months although some of them managed to stem their hefty losses.

Founded by brothers Oliver, Alexander and Marc Samwer in 2007, Rocket has set up dozens of ecommerce sites, aiming to replicate the success of Amazon and Alibaba in new markets in Africa, Latin America and Russia.

Rocket said the average weighted net revenues of its leading start-ups that it dubs its "proven winners" rose 120 percent in the first nine months, compared to 142 percent for the first half.

Meanwhile, the average margin on earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) for the "proven winners" - all of which are still heavily loss-making - rose 4 percentage points in the nine months compared to a year ago.